Missouri man faces new charge after sodomy charges dropped

A south-central Missouri man faces a new charge about a year after a judge ordered authorities to drop charges accusing him of sodomizing an infant.

Aaron Michael Fisher, 28, was recently charged with first-degree assault after a judge in October 2015 ordered two charges of sodomy be dismissed because Fisher, who had been accused of sodomizing a 5-month-old in 2009, had been denied his right to a speedy trial, The Kansas City Star reported.

Fisher was arrested after the new charge was filed, and his bond is set at $100,000. A hearing on the new charge is set for Monday at the Miller County Courthouse in Tuscumbia.

“We got him extradited and he’s going to be spending some time back in Missouri for a while,” said Miller County prosecutor Ben Winfrey. Winfrey declined to comment further about the new case. Fisher’s lawyer, Kimberly Kollmeyer of Jefferson City, also declined comment.

Kansas City defense attorney John Picerno, who is not involved, said the statute of limitations and double jeopardy could come into play. Also, elements used in charges that a judge ordered dismissed typically cannot be used to file new charges, Picerno said.

“Sounds like they’re trying to get him any way they can,” he said.

The case encountered a series of continuances and delays. And, in July 2014, Fisher pleaded guilty but later recanted, saying he didn’t remember what happened. The judge allowed Fisher to withdraw his guilty plea.

In October 2015, Cole County Circuit Judge Patricia Joyce granted a motion by a public defender that Fisher had been denied his right to a speedy trial. Her ruling criticized former Miller County prosecutor Matt Howard for failing to bring the case to trial, noting Howard “blatantly disregarded the United States Constitution and the Missouri Constitution in that he had at least six trial settings over a 5-year period and failed to bring any type of justice to the county of Miller.”

Winfrey, who had taken over the prosecutor’s job 10 months earlier, immediately filed notice that he would ask the Missouri Court of Appeals’ Western District in Kansas City to overturn Joyce’s ruling. But last month, the court of appeals affirmed Joyce’s ruling, saying the state had failed to prove that Fisher caused the delays.

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